CLC Supports Mancini for TNDP Chair

This past week, delegates to the AFL-CIO’s Central Labor Council of Nashville and Middle Tennessee (CLC) passed a motion to support Mary Mancini as chair of the Tennessee Democratic Party. We took this action after much discussion, but certain of the fact that the state’s Democratic Party needs new energy and a new focus on working families and basic pocketbook issues.

We feel Mary Mancini is the best candidate among the handful of good candidates up for the position who will channel our working-class values toward a new day for Democrats in our state. While serving as executive director of Tennessee Citizen Action, Mary has proven herself as a champion of workers against a harsh Republican agenda to gut worker-friendly programs and balance a state budget by making it more difficult for common people and indeed the working-poor to make ends meet.

She built a state-wide coalition of CLCs and local labor unions to resist Gov. Haslam’s cuts to workers’ compensation; she has continuously stood for the basic right of safe workplaces, a livable wage, and the preservation of benefits such as good pensions, affordable health care, and family-friendly workplace initiatives; and she believes strongly that a sustainable economy is dependent on full-time and direct employment, rather than temp jobs and contingency workforces. Because of her commitment to labor issues, in 2013 Mary received the Tennessee State AFL-CIO’s Presidential Award.

For these reasons and the fact that we know Mary Mancini can put together a progressive team and plan of action that will revitalize Democrats across the state, we ask for your vote as a member of the Tennessee Democratic Party’s Executive Committee on January 10, 2015. We are also confident that with her energy, commitment, and ability to build cohesion among progressive forces in Tennessee, Democrats will regain the needed strength to reverse the regressive and reactionary agenda that has gripped our state. The CLC of Nashville and Middle Tennessee looks forward to being a part of this renewal.